NAU MAI, HAERE MAI

Welcome to FaithCentral, a Religious Education resource website for students and teachers of Catholic Secondary Schools and Colleges in Aotearoa - New Zealand

Within this site you will find supplementary material supporting the Understanding Faith Curriculumthat is taught in all of our Catholic Yr 9-13 schools. All texts are available to staff as PDF files in the Staffroom. New BYOD-friendly PDFs will soon be available for students in the Classroom.

Why Religious Education?

Religious education in schools is distinct from, but complementary to, catechesis. It has an important role in the overall formation offered by the school. The religious education curricula statements for both primary and secondary Catholic schools in Aotearoa New Zealand point out that the school community has a twofold role. Firstly, it is charged with creating an environment that “proclaims what it teaches by providing pastoral care and fostering mutually respectful relationships, and by providing opportunities for prayer, sacramental celebrations and rituals.” Secondly, the school teaches the religious education programme “in a way that promotes students’ learning.”

Religious education takes the form of a school subject, presenting the Christian message and the Christian event with the same seriousness and depth with which other learning areas present their knowledge. Religious education needs to permeate the integral formation of students with the Gospel as they absorb the knowledge and values presented by all the subject areas of the curriculum. This is its proper evangelising character within the ministry of the Word.

In the context of the Catholic school, religious education is part of, and is completed by, other forms of the ministry of the Word, for example, catechesis, homilies, and liturgical celebrations. Schools need to work closely with families and parishes in the Christian formation of the students.

Maria (A short film about Grief)
This is a powerful Pasifika reflection on encountering grief. (It won the 2017 PBS On-Line Film Festival – Most Popular award.) ..

July 11, 2017

Death – A Catholic response to Humanism
A simple response to secular understandings of Death from a general Catholic perspective. Certainly not an attack on any humanist friends just a tongue-in-cheek response to some of ..

FaithCentral is mandated by the NZ Catholic Bishops’ Conference for use by years 9-13 pupils in all Catholic schools in Aotearoa New Zealand. FaithCentral is administered by the National Centre for Religious Studies, a centre within the Catholic Institute of Aotearoa NZ.